Yul Edochie’s apology to his wife is not enough — By Emeka Ugwuonye
5 min read
Yul Edochie and May Edochie
There was no doubt in any reasonable mind that Yul Edochie’s decision to marry a second wife was a catastrophic mistake that had the potential to destroy him and his beautiful career path ten times over. Of course, at a time of great stress and moral ambiguity in Nigeria, many men with various social and psychological turmoil in their lives supported Yul’s action, which they believed justified their own thoughts and desires to date multiple women or control the women in their worlds. For us at DPA, we are guided by principles of fairness, equity and justice, which has always enabled us to recognize polygamy as an obvious abnormality, if for no other reason, for the fact that women are not allowed to marry two men at once, even though they are biologically more suitable to satisfy multiple sexual partners.
Polygamy is not a biological necessity. It is not justified by law, neither does it square well with any notion of equality and justice. It is also not economically efficient. The only reason polygamy exists today is ignorance or Ned Nwoko-type megalomania. Guided by these principles, DPA condemned Yul Edochie’s action. Also, in my writings, I predicted that he would get into trouble very soon over that.
True to my prediction, Yul Edochie has exhibited various forms of abnormal behavior, and even madness, since he took the decision. I can point out instances of what I call madness. First, Yul Edochie, has gone over the mountain trying to justify his polygamy. The extraordinary extent he has gone on that pursuit is sufficient basis to conclude that he realized he was in trouble. When you are doing the right thing, there is no need to justify and explain yourself the way Yul Edochie has done over his polygamy. He pointed at his wife’s recent careers successes as evidence that his polygamy favored his wife. Quite absurd! He recently claimed that God told him to be polygamous, which is indeed the height of his madness. He even quoted the Bible to justify polygamy in 2022. The fact is that Yul Edochie has clearly not been at peace with himself or the with society since his polygamy.
In the past few days, we have seen Yul Edochie’s story all over the media where he purportedly apologized to his wife, May. He said many silly things and called them an apology. But no, it was not an apology. To be an apology your statement must contain three essential elements of apology. First, it must admit full your action that is wrongp, without any justification. Second, the statement must show remorse – that is, it must state that you sincerely regret what you did. Third, it must state that you will not repeat or continue such wrong. So, you can see how impossible it is for Yul Edochie to apologize for his polygamy and remain in that union with Judy Austin. It is not possible to apologize to May and remain with Judy, unless he only meant to assure May that he would not marry a third wife. You cannot apologize for a wrong that continues.
Also, the purported apology did not admit that he was really wrong. Instead, he tried to justify his actions and even insinuated that May was herself not a perfect person. Invariably, one can see Yul Edochie on a steady slide into deeper crisis. We expect that May will eventually divorce him or that he will eventually break from Judy Austin, or the two possibilities will occur – he will lose both women.
Let’s closely examine what has been described as open apology by Yul Edochie to his wife, May. It goes as follows:
“To my dear wife, Queen May Yul-Edochie. I acknowledge that I hurt you deeply and I’ve apologised to you countless times”.
(He admits that he has hurt her and has apologized countless times. But why countless times? Because May did not accept his apology the first time. But how did he hurt her? He hurt her by having a second wife. That was not something that was done and finished. Rather, having a second wife is something that continues as long as he remains married to Judy Austin. So, Edochie will have to continue to apologize for as long as he remains married to Judy Austin.)
“I take the blame for my actions. I agree with you that polygamy shouldn’t be forced on anyone. You never bargained for it from the beginning neither did I. But I guess life happens. You already know the whole story.”
(He admits that May objected to his polygamy and has not accepted it. She has not accepted to have Judy Austin as a co-wife. Instead of taking full responsibility for his action, he made it sound as if the decision to marry Judy Austin was something forced upon him by fate. So, he describes it as “life happens”. No, life doesn’t happen. Human beings make decisions and they should bear responsibility for their decisions. In fact, in this case, it was not a decision made suddenly. He first decided to commit adultery, not once but continually. He decided to get another woman pregnant. It is wrong to suggest that the pregnancy was what controlled your decisions and action when in fact you caused the pregnancy)
“I didn’t do it to disrespect you. I didn’t do it to replace you, nor because I do not love you anymore, no. I have always loved you and always will”.
(It is actually not Yul Edochie that should determine how his actions should be interpreted. It is May. Everyone else involved is an adult and should be allowed to tell what they feel. Yul cannot tell May what to feel about his polygamy. That in itself is an insult).
“Out of 100, I have done 99 things right. Hating me because of one thing isn’t the best. Nobody is perfect. I’m not. You’re not. Nobody is, except God”.
(Again, this is an act of self-justification. And to suggest that he and May were on the same moral plain was wrong. She is not perfect, but she has not committed adultery and certainly her imperfections cannot justify his polygamy).
“I’ve been a good husband and a wonderful father. I’ve supported all your hustle from day one. I have been an exceptional father to our children to date, making sure they lack nothing and always there for everyone”.
(Again, this is a pointless self-serving justification, which causes his apology to fall far short of the minimum standard of an apology. Indeed, it is nothing but another futile justification campaign).
Yul Edochie is better advised to keep quiet and try to manage or mitigate the crisis he willfully brought upon himself and his family. Indeed, his excuses and justifications are as absurd as those of Ned Nwoko who urged Nigerian men to marry more than one wife in order to help the women. For Ned, marriage is the only path to glory for women. Ned never considered the fact that many men in his country are not married at all because of the government-induced poverty, which Ned Nwoko accepts as okay. Instead of helping unmarried men to get married, Ned wants the married ones to marry more wives in order to help women.
